Annie Gilbertson of public radio station KPCC in Los Angeles somehow managed to get the emails that broke open the Los Angeles iPad fiasco. Once her story broke, Superintendent John Deasy canceled the contract with Apple and Pearson.
Gilbertson reported:
“The emails show the officials detailed aspects of a one-to-one student technology program, down to the specifics of tech support and teacher training. A year later, the requirements for proposals resembled the package Pearson was selling.
“KPCC aired and published stories on those emails Friday. On Monday, Superintendent John Deasy announced he was canceling the contract with Apple and Pearson and issuing a new request for proposals for the one-to-one technology project.
“L.A. Unified’s technology expansion, including upgrading wifi at schools, is poised to be the largest in the country with a price tag of nearly $1.3 billion.”
Now Ken Bramlett, the Inspector General of the schools, has decided to reopen an investigation that had been closed, based on those emails.
Hopefully, any future purchases will not take money from the bond issue that voters approved for school repair and construction. Having a clean, safe, up-to-date, beautiful school to attend should be the civil right of every student in Los Angeles.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Good work Annie Gilbertson and KPCC for exposing this! It is one more example of dishonesty and corruption destroying our public schools via Bill Gates, Apple, and Pearson. Their slimy conspiracy of greed is now pervasive all over the county, but LA just happened to be fortunate enough to have a crime stopper called Annie Gilbertson who represents Power of the People.
Annie is a SuperHero! Take that Bill Gates….Bam….Bam…Bam…!
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Well done, Annie. Pearson is actually engaged in a nation-wide systematic crime with its illegal programs to promote “district level adoption” of its profit-driven tablet products.
Once a district is dedicated to the consumption of corrupt corporate influence, honest evaluation and discussion are gone. Anthony Cody published my own reflection on the iPad roll out in my district, and its effect on students, on his new Living in Dialog blog. There’s a link to a Pearson training page, and a couple of good links in the comments about who is funding this expansion drive.
I’d be interested in comments people might have about how teachers can help our students come out of this whole outrage with something positive.
http://www.livingindialogue.com/ipad-fiasco-terms-service-say-rights/
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Questions:
Why is Superintendent John Deasy still employed by LA Unified and not on admin leave until the investigation is completed?
Why are school districts allowed to investigate “themselves” when there has been a crime involving federal money rather than the FBI?
Why are school superintendents all over the country so deficient in honesty, moral courage, and integrity that they can be easily influenced by money and power?
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cha ching!
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Number one question-The BOE doesn’t follow its own policies or they are just meant for teachers.
Number two question-They investigate themselves so that nothing really harmful is discovered. The truth be damn
Number third- Superintendents are so dishonest and clueless as to educational systems because they all graduate from the Broad Academy of deformers and if they’re really, really bad, they got their Phd’s online.
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I hope Deasy has his reputation fried to a nice crisp, that he loses his job, is disgraced, and won’t even be able to get a job in school as a volunteer. He should be transplanted to San Diego, where at the zoo, he can feed the lions, and I’m not talking as caretaker.
It would be best if he eventually be put in jail.
Imagine that Deasy worked for Gates and for iPad before Eli Broad and former mayor Villaraigosa entrenched him his LAUSD Supt. gig with no national search and no other competing candidates.
He “earned” his PhD with only 9 units of credit in a few months from the administrator at University of Lousivllle who, by the way, is now in prison for defrauding the university. This same guy was hired by Deasy at a rate of $370,000 to consult for him in California.
Deasy and his cronies reek of corruption, and metaphorically speaking, he needs to be pushed to the floor by the law so that parents, children, and educators can politically tap dance on this trachea.
Music, please . . . .
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He can work at Pearson or Amplify.
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He should work in a prison as one of the prisoners. Let him clean the toilets. With his big mouth.
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If it turns out like the Cobb County Apple scandal, he (or his underlings) have likely already secured jobs with Apple.
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Susan Ohanian provides details of Deasy’s corrupt behavior, fake degree and his connections with Gates, Broad and Felner.
http://susanohanian.org/show_outrages.php?id=9593
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This debacle shockingly echoes the Apple scandal in Cobb County, GA (one of the nation’s largest school districts) in the early 00’s. In Cobb, the involved superintendent was indicted and lost his job (he probably kept his golden parachute). Are indictments brewing for LAUSD? Is Apple just flat-out corrupt–I have no doubts Pearson is.
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Given that this potentially involves bid-rigging (a felony criminal offense under the Sherman Antitrust Act), one would think that the US Justice Department should now be involved.
of course, should is not the same as will.
Whatever else may be true, I’d bet the lawyers at Apple and Pearson have put in a lot of overtime in the last couple days because if they were involved in bid-rigging, they could potentially be in very deep manure.
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If Deasy is indicted I would be totally shocked. This is Hollywood man. You can murder someone here as a celebrity and never get a day in jail. Seriously though, we already know the bidding process for the iPads was rigged. Deasy and the district will try to put it on Aquino. Aquino is a chump if he allows that. I would sing all day long if I were Aquino. At least he had the sense to get out early before this hit the fan. Deasy’s arrogance will be his downfall.
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Just another reminder that the petty criminals are in prison, while the white collar criminals are running the country!
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